Hello! I started playing around in Photoshop earlier and entertaining the thought of trying to make a CW myself... but one problem was I couldn't seem to figure out what brush settings to use. I tried to use the default circle brush, and I fiddled about with the various options like Hardness, Spacing, and so on, but it ended up either too fuzzy/anti-aliased or not anti-aliased enough. In other words, no matter what, I couldn't seem to match Subeta's outlines.

If anyone else here uses Photoshop to draw this stuff, could you please tell me what kind of brush settings to use? I did see Cathii's brush settings file in the Google drive link, but it was for SAI and I don't know how to convert that information into Photoshop. :(

Thank you so much, if anybody can help!

good lord i need help too please

atm i use default brush round hard brush at size 3px with default settings using 250x500 canvas but i still usually end up having to thin my lines? but 2px is too smol sjdkhklds please help!!!! ;w;

i honestly really really hate my lines and everything about my own art tbh save me

This is the story of my life. I used to have SAI, but then switched to a Mac, and now I'm trying to figure out how to line in PS, and it gives me a stroke every single time. I heard that Fire Alpaca was similar to SAI in terms of line smoothing, but I've been trying to draw on it and not really getting great results - not like SAI. I feel like Photoshop is so overwhelming with how many features there are, and how you can customize everything - it just makes my head explode, because my lines NEVER look as good as other people's lines, no matter how much time I spend perfecting them. GAH.

Omg but you both make beautiful CWs, that also get accepted by staff XD So even if your lines aren't perfect, they must be good enough. Mine just come out way too pixelly OR too transparent... ughhh

To though: You use the default round brush at 3px???? Cuz when I do that.. it just comes out super transparent, it ends up looking fuzzy instead of like outlines that Subeta items have. It makes me wonder if something's just wrong with my settings to begin with.

What do you think about if I just... duplicate the outline layer, to make the line darker/more solid, but keep the same(ish) thickness? Maybe that would work? I suppose it's worth a try.

Hope somebody with Photoshop knowledge comes along soon to help us all!

Personally I use Photoshop, and I've gotten a few CWs accepted like the following for instance (I mostly do best with animals/companions personally, but you get the gist) -

This is what I personally use (these are all links because I don't want to hit the forum image limit size) -

Second Default Brush / 2px Transfer / Pen Pressure / 0% Jitter

And here's an example of how my lineart looks, for instance -

Full Size Resize

What I tend to do is double up my lines (and also decrease any shakiness / not quite smooth precision) by drawing over them twice. I find duplicating the lines actually makes them too sharp personally, and then utilize the eraser tool a lot!

you are a lifesaver!!! I'm gonna try this out as soon as I... sleep XD (I accidentally stayed up all night again...) But thank you so much! I'll definitely try duplicating the lines. I think I can just duplicate the layer and play with the opacity of the duplicate layer to try and get the line to be the right sharpness... I'll have to play about and see.

I don't have a tablet or pen, which is part of why I want to stick to Photoshop actually as I'm quite comfortable using my mouse there... Maybe one day I'll be able to afford a tablet, ahhh, a lovely pipe dream X)

Oh you know, duplicating the layer and playing around with both opacity AND sharpness (the Filter at the top - Sharpen or Sharpen More) can really help a lot actually if you don't have a tablet. Either that, or actually changing the Opacity of your brush instead of the layer to mimic the Pen Pressure effect to some degree! (The brush opacity on the top left of the menu bar instead of where the Layers are - if you need to me to screenshot anything to show you where it is, let me know.)

Also get to bed, you! Heehee. Goodness. x'D

[edit]

Something else that can be useful while drawing and testing your lines - if you want to see a quick view of your image at resize without having to zoom in and out constantly, you can click Window (at the top, like File / Edit / Filter for instance) - Arrange - New Window for Your-File-Name and just zoom out to 50% on the secondary window, and then you'll get a view both of your working size and the resize simultaneously.

ALSO also if you press Command (Mac) / CTRL (Windows, I think - I use a Mac so I'm not 100% sure) + K at the same time, (or just Photoshop - next to File - Preferences - General), there's multiple options in a drop down for "Image Interpolation" you can test out for your lines as well. This actually changes HOW it resizes the image - sometimes it can resize it sharper, or smoother, depending on what you need. (I tend to use Bicubic, but it depends on the image sometimes honestly.)

(Just don't use Nearest Neighbor unless you're trying to draw something pixelated! In which case, Photoshop can resize pixel-related artwork without anti-aliasing the lines using Nearest Neighbor.)